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Thursday, March 29, 2012

94 doctors convicted, only 15 punished

PNDT ActNew Delhi: As India celebrates the Day of the Girl Child on Tuesday, a major lapse in the implementation of Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) Act has come to light.The Central Supervisory Board set up to monitor implementation of the Act has found that of the 94 doctors convicted under the Act, licences of only 15 have been cancelled by the Medical Council of India (MCI).

While the board has asked the MCI to expedite cancellation of licences, MCI chief Dr K K Talwar said he was not aware why the delay has happened. “We will find out. Our endeavour always is to clear backlog in such matters,” he said. The board has also urged professional bodies to evolve a code of conduct for their members to ensure they do not indulge in sex determination. The Health Ministry, on its part, has asked state governments to identify unregistered ultrasound machine, possessing of which has been made a punishable offence.

“We have taken a large number of initiatives in the last one year to ensure better implementation of PNDT Act. We are about to notify the ban on portable ultrasound machines except in registered medical institutes. We have also maintained that we are in favour of use of technology for the purpose but have not so far started recommending use of active tracker. It is up to the district authorities how they want to do it,” said joint secretary in the health ministry Anuradha Gupta.

The ministry, Gupta added, has commissioned a study on the efficacy of the active tracker on ultrasound machines, which sends data on the use of the machine....